Carlsen Wins Norway Chess; Aronian Finishes Half a Point Behind
It took him four tries, but Magnus Carlsen has finally won Norway Chess, the super-tournament created by his countrymen to showcase their top player, the world chess champion and world #1. In 2013 and 2014 Sergey Karjakin won the tournament, and last year it was Veselin Topalov who finished first.
This time around Carlsen was in control most of the way, and after defeating Vladimir Kramnik in an impressive game in round 7 (of 9) it looked like smooth sailing. He was playing well and riding a 42-game undefeated streak; what could possibly go wrong? The answer came in the very next round, as Levon Aronian in turn beat him rather badly to catch up with him and share the lead. Had they finished the last round tied there would have been a playoff, but Carlsen rebounded to defeat Pavel Eljanov with white while Aronian was unable to get anywhere with Black against Pentala Harikrishna. Carlsen finished with 6/9; Aronian with 5.5.
Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Topalov, and Kramnik finished a further half a point behind, while Li Chao and Harikrishna concluded their tournaments with creditable 50% scores. Anish Giri had a poor event by his standards, only scoring 4/9; Eljanov lost his last three games to wind up with just 3 points, and Nils Grandelius brought up the rear with 2.5 points.
Here are Carlsen's last three games, with brief comments.
Reader Comments (1)
Thanks for the notes on Carlsen-Kramnik. Hopefully, I'll be able to figure out just where the latter went wrong in that game. Carlsen's novelty of playing his knight to e2 looks rather obvious, and it's surprising no one had apparently played it before.
[DM: It doesn't look obvious to me, at any rate. It is part of a logical plan (especially once we see how effective it is), but to move a developed piece three more times without developing the bishop, taking care of the king (and inviting ...Bb4+), or connecting the rooks isn't obvious. As for figuring out where Black went wrong, the comments after moves 6, 12, and 13; and the punctuation to Black's 14th moves aren't exactly abandoning you to your own resources!]